The first six months

Setting up CLIC

Stephen Singleton joined the CCG in August 2013 to support the set up and development of CLIC. The first steps prior to formally establishing CLIC were to build networks across the Alliance organisations and establish an operational group from across the Alliance organisations to start developing a CLIC work programme.

Currently, along with Stephen Singleton, three staff have been seconded into CLIC since February 2014 (one from CPFT and two from the CCG) to develop the work programme and an administrator has also been recruited.

CLIC have established a temporary base at Hackthorpe Hall which is set up and furnished as a learning environment. The team have worked with other staff across the Alliance to develop and communicate the CLIC approach and Cumbria County Council have contributed specific support, through the Knowledge Management Team, to help develop a CLIC website (www.theclic.org.uk). Many ‘back office’ functions have also been developed and implemented including standard working templates, electronic document sharing systems, event booking, budget setting etc.

The CLIC Strategy Development

CLIC is the vehicle to help support the delivery of the Alliance priorities that are emerging from the five year plan. CLIC will drive a positive transformation in health and social care across Cumbria by leading and embedding a culture of collaboration for continuous improvement and learning. In support of this purpose, the CLIC team, working with the CLIC operations group, have developed strategies and objectives for CLIC in three key overlapping areas:

Education and Learning

The Cumbria Production System

Leadership

A work programme has been established for each of these areas. The Alliance leaders have adopted an outline version of the three strategies (see Purpose and Strategies). CLIC have received many requests for support and have developed a set of criteria to apply to assess how best CLIC can add value and support the delivery of Alliance priorities.

Some initiatives CLIC have supported and delivered in the last six months

In order to promote the awareness of CLIC and start implementing the work programme, CLIC have supported a number of projects, initiatives and events:

Roll out of the Blue Stream e-learning package for General Practice

Leading and facilitating two Rapid Process Improvement Workshops

Leading and facilitating a Developing the Market workshop with the CCG and providers

Supporting and developing Year of Care training

Organising the sharing of clinical best practice with “GP Update” sessions for clinicians in all Cumbria practices

Raise awareness of the role of CLIC and improvement methods (attendance at various events such as Protected Learning sessions and the Health Builders conference)

Facilitating events with heath and care providers to develop thinking and progress development of services for the Frail Elderly

Progress with the work programme for each CLIC strategy

During the last six months, CLIC have developed links across the Alliance organisations to start to share learning resources and best practice. An Education and Learning workshop is planned in June 2014 to plan future collaboration and develop joint training programmes. CLIC hopes to explore the idea of developing a common training platform, using best practice and sharing learning across organisations and develop learning opportunities between organisations at every level. CLIC will support large collaborative projects by supporting learning together in teams and training staff to be able to continually improve and develop the skills and knowledge they will need to deliver services outlined in the 5 year plan.

CLIC have developed links with staff across Alliance organisations to share continuous improvement approaches, methods and tools. There have been two workshops that have supported the scoping of improvement work across all Alliance organisations, shared best practice and agreed a joint approach to continuous improvement called the Cumbria Production System. A small group of experienced improvement staff from across the Alliance organisations have developed a Cumbria Production system workbook to act as a practical best practice guide to continuous improvement, using real examples from all our organisations. The first introductory workshops in the Cumbria Production System will be offered to staff across the Alliance, starting monthly in June 2014. The improvement resources will be available on the CLIC website and a network of CLIC ‘faculty’ members/improvement champions will develop across our organisations.

CLIC have developed links with staff across the Alliance organisations to share approaches to Leadership development and there has been a workshop to look at how leadership is developed and embedded across the Alliance organisations and in particular how CLIC can support leadership for improvement. A CLIC leadership programme is being developed and workshops will commence in late June with senior leadership sessions to embed an understanding of the role of supporting and influencing an improvement culture.

The current work programme

CLIC have been asked to support a number of initiatives and projects during the last six months and these all form part of the current work programme or are being scoped to assess how CLIC can help. These include:

Supporting for training in areas such as Autism, Care Homes, End of Life, Practice Managers, Deciding Rights etc

In support of the development and finalisation of the Alliance five year plan, CLIC have supported a number of engagement events to seek feedback on the emerging 5 year plan. The events have focussed on engaging professionals in how we can implement the plan and agree a set of principles and behaviours in working collaboratively. CLIC has facilitated other events to support the development of a collaborative workforce plan. A session to explore Primary Care Community development and approaches being taken by our organisations will also help to feed views into this development as a key priority in the five year plan.

CCG Organisational Development support

CLIC has a specific function into the CCG to support the development of the new organisation. As such CLIC have:

supported regular CCG staff development events

assisted in training needs analysis

development of a curriculum to meet those needs

supported a workshop for senior team development

The next six months for CLIC

The CLIC work programme for the next six months focuses on delivering the objectives for each of the CLIC strategies including a programme of improvement workshops, support for Rapid Process Improvement Workshops, development of an Alliance Leadership programme, deliver a public engagement event, and further joint learning events. A series of workshops have been planned in June with the key Alliance leaders to explore the challenges of leading transformation and delivering the five year plan. As the 5 year plan moves into implementation, CLIC expect to work with teams across organisations to embed improvement approaches to support key Alliance priorities.

In summary

CLIC are just at the beginning of taking a leading role influencing and supporting the changes needed in how we jointly approach learning, leadership and improvement. Small incremental changes are happening and CLIC welcome the opportunity to continue to support all the Alliance organisations with improvement approaches, joint learning and leadership development.